a memory

I’m sitting in front of my laptop. My quaint mini portable iBook. I’m writing up a study sheet for my Latin exam. I’m writing with one hand as my left hand holds the good page in my schoolbook. I type with my thumb, index and major fingers and remember my Oma’s typewriter. She had one of those heavy ones. An old one. Like what you’d see in the movie Naked Lunch, except not portable. To erase a letter we’d have to back-space and stick an eraser ribbon between the sheet of paper and the ink ribbon and re-type the letter, covering it up. I remember my loving this typewriter. (I think Shawn now has it.) I remember writing on it, pretending I was writing a book. And Oma telling me that I should take typing lessons to learn how to type quickly and well. I was impressed when she told me that she could type without even looking at the keypads. She took typing lessons in Holland when she was a young woman. She told me how they would practice in school typing with some sheet of paper over their fingers so they wouldn’t see the pads.